Bulgarians Nine Times Richer by Moving to the UK

The official stance of the UK government is that the labor restrictions for Bulgarians and Romanians will be lifted from January 1, 2014. Photo by EPA/BGNES

Daily Express

by Martin Brown

Bulgarian and Romanian migrants would be nearly nine times better off if they move to Britain when access ­restrictions are lifted at the end of the year, a study revealed yesterday.

A family of four from Bulgaria could boost their weekly income from £62 at home to £543 here, it said.

Similar families – made up of one individual on minimum wage with a dependent spouse and two children – from Romania would see their weekly income soar from about £70 a week.

Elsewhere, single workers from ­eastern European countries would be four or five times better off, the study by MigrationWatch UK found.

Its chairman Sir Andrew Green said: "The wage differences turn out to be simply stunning.

"The previous government made a huge mistake agreeing to accession treaties that granted full access to our labour market to workers from ­countries that have only a fifth of our gross domestic product per head.

"Given that the economic incentives for Romanian and Bulgarian workers are twice those now enjoyed by Polish workers, it would be absurd to suggest that there will not be a ­significant inflow."

Temporary curbs were imposed on Romanians and Bulgarians in 2005 to protect the British labour market but they expire in December.

The Government has refused to provide an estimate on the number of Romanians or Bulgarians it expects to arrive in Britain but Migration- Watch previously said it could be up to 50,000 a year for the first five years.

A single person in Romania on the minimum wage would have a weekly income of about £55 whereas in the UK that same person could earn £254. In Bulgaria a single person on ­minimum wage earns around £49.

MigrationWatch said child benefit for two children, even if they remain in their home countries, equals a week’s take-home pay at the minimum wage in Romania.

If the worker should lose his or her job in Britain, unemployment benefit in the UK is equivalent to more than twice the take-home pay at the minimum wage in Romania or Bulgaria.

Leading politicians in Bulgaria and Romania have dismissed fears of a wave of immigration to Britain.

Bulgarians would prefer Germany, Spain and Italy because of stronger business links, said Bulgarianforeign minister Nikolay Mladenov.

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Warning ;-) : Beware Daily Express with its de-facto "Brits, beware
Bulgarians who will be robbing you"...............Nine Times Richer?
I'd recommend UBS study "Prices and Earnings: A comparison of purchasing power around the globe" :

And the British moving to Bulgaria are bringing their money with them from the UK rather than taking money from Bulgaria, In fact Britons must sign a declaration here that they will not take anything from Bulgaria's social fund. Britain now has more than 4 million young people unemployed plus the older unemployed many of whom have been fired by unscrupulous companies in order to replace them with cheap labour from abroad - and the British government can do nothing to tackle this situation because of EU rules. It is one thing for a foreign worker to spend a few uncomfortable years in cramped housing and take home a pile of money. It is another thing for the Briton who is trying to build a home and family in his own country and can not be sure if he will still have a job next year - and has no other country to run home to after a few years

WARNING
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The other side of the coin. Bread costs about 5 lev a loaf, cigarettes about 15 lev for 20, a beer about 6 lev. Council tax around 270 lev PER MONTH rent on a 3 bed house.apartment about 1700 lev PER MONTH. Car fuel about 3.20 lev per litre, average electricity prices about 200 lev per month. All this plus all the other needs for everyday life and living means that you NEED nine times the average Bulgarian wage to scrape along the bottom in the UK. Please, please do not "hoodwink" your Bulgarian readers with headlines that make the eyes go misty so they are unable to see the pitfalls. So many other immigrants have gone to the UK to "make their fortunes" only to end up in poverty with their dreams smashed. I am not suggesting that Bulgarians can't better themselves in the UK, with a large amount of luck (especially in this economic crisis) and hard work it can be done but, it is not as easy as this article and similar ones suggest, for every success there may be 20 failures.